


Route 66

by justbygrace



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Hitchhiking, Set in America
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-02
Updated: 2017-04-02
Packaged: 2018-10-13 19:52:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 986
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10520688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justbygrace/pseuds/justbygrace
Summary: Hitchhiker AU





	

**Author's Note:**

> This was the first Dr Who story I ever wrote way back in 2013.

She's lounging against a red pack, almost swallowed up in a pink sweatshirt and well-worn boots, eyes closed against the late afternoon sun. She is vaguely aware of her surroundings, people walking by, doors slamming, revving engines, snatches of conversation, but none of it really catches her interest. At some point she will summon the energy to stand and move and strike up conversation, to call on her signature smile and charm someone else to drive her at least a few more miles, but not right now. Right now she wants to forget, to banish the memories of why she is here in the first place and maybe even catch a few minutes of shut eye if she is extremely lucky. 

He was definitely supposed to have made the Oklahoma state line about six hours ago, but he's running behind schedule again, as usual. He knows someone somewhere will have plenty to say on the subject, but not to him, never to him. He's too valuable, already logged too many hours, has gained them too many word-of-mouth recommendations for them to do much more than grumble and ask him to "Please, try to make it within a reasonable time frame." And he will make it to his next stop in said reasonable time frame, he just absolutely positively needs to stop and see this one historical marker and then he'll be back on the road again.

She hears him before she sees him. Something about the timbre of his voice or maybe the way it hasn't stopped for the last several minutes has her opening her eyes, lifting her head. She spots him, crouched next to the plaque not thirty feet from her head, peering at the words through horn-rimmed glasses. The late August weather doesn't warrant the long coat and she's just trying to list what professions require someone to dress in a pin-striped suit and if it's worth seeing if he could be a potential ride, when he swivels his head and catches her gaze. He gives her as much deliberate concentration as he had the marker. She should be taken aback, creeped out by the frankness in his expression, but she can't bring herself to mind very much.

He's been driving truck cross country since before he was out of high school and he knows all the different types of people one meets along the way; she doesn't fit into a single one of his categories. She's young, impossibly young, he'd almost say too young, but then she shifts and he can see her eyes and they tell him stories of things seen and experiences had. He has the sudden urge to grab her hand and ask her to run, to dance, to adventure and explore. He thinks he might be able to fly if she would only hold his hand. He almost forgets he hasn't even asked her name.

She is surprised when he directs his words to her. She had been expecting polish and manners, what she gets are a barely contained excitement and a rush of words. For a moment she lets herself get carried away, the sound of his voice soothing away a hundred miles of hurt and dust. She catches one word in every ten, something about science and toast and have you seen that? He doesn't seem to be expecting an answer and she isn't sure what the question was, but when she finds he's crossed the distance between them and is seated next to her, she can't help but give him a real smile. He pauses mid-sentence, head cocked and regarding, and then continues on. She throws back her head and laughs for the first time in six months.

He gazes at her outstretched hand in confusion and delight and then accepts it in one of his own. Her name is still ringing in his ears, burrowing its way into his heart and he answers it with his own, the only one he wants to be known by anymore. He continues telling her about the people who lived here once, the history of the place, falling back on the comfort of familiar stories so that he can concentrate all of his brain power on cataloging every micro-expression that crosses her face. He is pretty sure he could spend the rest of his life sitting here watching her and he wouldn't be able to identify all of them. When his ramblings reference his truck, he can practically see her ears perk up and he is suddenly hoping beyond hope that she might, maybe, if he is very lucky, want to ride with him for at least a little while.

She can hear her mum's warnings in her head, dire prophecies regarding strange men and evil intentions, but there is something about his eyes, genuine and warm and oh-so-hopeful, that fill her with something that feels oddly like coming home. When he shows her his truck, beaming at it like a proud papa, she almost laughs. It's a blue thing, on the older side, but well-loved and it so obviously fits him that she only just resists the urge to shout her excitement to the universe. He asks where she is going and she doesn't know what to say. Anywhere, nowhere, wherever you're going. In the end, she just grins at him again and he seems content with that. 

He can hardly contain himself when she scrambles into the cab, exclaiming over it being bigger-on-the-inside. When she stows her pack in the back and curls into the passenger seat like she belongs there, he can feel his heart skip a beat, several in a row, in fact. He adjusts the radio, offers her a bottle of water, and heads back to the interstate. They are ten miles away from the Oklahoma border before he realizes that she is fast asleep and that she is still holding his hand.


End file.
